


Seraph of a Distant Star

by kangarex



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Thrawn Series - Timothy Zahn (2017)
Genre: Alchemy, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Magic, Alternate Universe - Medieval, Blood Pacts, Other, Seraphim, Summoning, Telepathic Bond
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-04
Updated: 2021-01-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:22:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26808070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kangarex/pseuds/kangarex
Summary: Eli clutched the bowl, shaking where he stood as he stared at the vellum. He didn’t know what sorcery he was playing with, so he swallowed with difficulty and cleared his voice as best as he could.“Let this pact become ours till eternity. Accept my offering of blood. I summon you golden general to vanquish my enemies.”That was what the incantation was supposed to be.
Comments: 14
Kudos: 24





	1. Chapter 1

Eli Vanto gulped nervously as he stepped in.

The room was larger than he had expected. The grey walls bore the stains of old masonry that had weathered through countless years. The cracks between each rough, raw stone filled with mortar of a later age to fortify it. The ceiling soared above him, but its corners remained shrouded in shadows in spite of the gloomy light filtering through the stained glass — scenes from the teachings of a forgotten time.

In the middle of the room, rough stone gave way to the smooth polished surface of obsidian marble. Smooth and glassy, its mica reflecting glints of light like the cursed portal to darker, starry dimension. Choirs of candles had been lit around it, drooling their blood-red wax into carefully balanced bowls of quartz so as not to soil the engraving. The acrid stench of raw smoke and ash like burnt bodies haunted the hall.

Faceless, near motionless guards lined the walls like gargoyles, clad in the blackened armour unique of nightforge. Before them, the master of ceremonies and his priests were garbed in ornate robes of white and ostentatious gold, but even such costumes of attributed purity resembled far more the sickly pallor of death and the richness of gluttony.  
  
The master of ceremonies’ face was shrouded beneath his heavy golden-tipped hood that bore the weight of an eagle figurine, but the whiskers of his chin drooped long wispy strands, laden with golden beads. He held an oversized staff with the eagle emblem that Eli reckoned was as heavy as he was, and perhaps took all of his effort to keep upright considering the additional weight of the thick crimson banner slung around the immense raptor’s wings.

“Come forward. Candidate.” The master’s voice groaned with age, bearing impatience.

Fear had rusted his movements since the night before, gnawing at his bones and giving him no rest. But now it metamorphosed into stark terror. Every voice in his head was screaming at him to throw down his offering and bolt for the exit.  
  
What happened to the previous candidate?

The thought alighted on his mind, giving him a new stab of horror. His breath caught in his throat, his nose and lungs choking on the smoky stench as his wooden steps followed the order.  
  
‘ _I don’t want this! I’m too young! I don’t want to die! I haven’t lived my life! What will my parents do without me? My parents…_ ’

Only the thought of his mother collapsing in grief, and his father standing ashen-faced amongst their humble abode, halted him from giving in to cowardice. If he turned now, he would be thrashed soundly and carted off to the dungeons, labelled a traitor, sold as hard labour or his family might even be hauled away. Quick deaths at the blade might be more merciful…

His heart pounded in his ears as his feet left the stone, and he stepped up onto the obsidian.

A sharp hiss spat from one of the attendants.  
  
“Remove your shoes you fool!”  
  
Eli flinched, quickly stepping off the sharp edge and bending to tug off his regulation boots and socks. What happened to the belongings of the previous candidate? Did he get to put them on? Or did one of the attendants just toss it outside?

He felt their vulture eyes pinned on him as he balanced his offering and stepped onto the marble, feeling the icy chill on his feet.  
  
The master motioned to the center with a finger, and Eli felt his pulse thundering in his chest. Yet some portion of his brain moved him, his hand lifting like a stiff marionette, accepting the parchment from one of the attendants. Distantly, as if watching from a possessed body, he noted that the attendant carried a thick stack of them. The implication only confirmed one of his suspicions. He was only one in a long line of candidates, and possible sacrifices.  
  
Eli grasped the paper, feeling its smooth silkiness between the pads of his fingers even as he clenched it tightly. This was high-quality vellum. He had never touched anything of this grade before, and he was suddenly acutely aware of the dirt under his fingernails. The enormity of this project. The helplessness of candidates like him against the vast, wealthy war machines of the Empire.

“Are you waiting for us to die of old age?” An attendant coughed, voice ragged from the ashen smoke. “Accursed fools. Pour your offering into the middle of the circle and read! You were taught to _read_ were you not?”

Eli winced, stepping to the middle of the wide circle and feeling the slightest of inclines in the cool stone beneath him. Unlike most of the peasantry he had been afforded some basics, and since his conscription and further allocation to this project, he had been rostered into additional classes. An administrative role would have raised his status and given his family more stable days… alas, such a hope was a mere illusion.

His eyes scanned the paper and he gulped. His brain struggled to reconcile the sigils, dredging them up from memories that were trying to flee his thoughts with the equal intensity of his spirit wanting to escape his looming doom. Then slowly, he remembered. One by one, he pieced the barely familiar script together, tumbling the words over in his mind.

Now he had to do it.

He tilted the bowl, wincing as the angle brought a fresh sting of pain to his bandaged wrist. The first droplets splattered, then the rivulet followed at cleaner pace as Eli used every ounce of his willpower to keep himself steady. Blood pooled in the indentation below, then flowed through the engraving with an almost unnatural speed that stole the air from Eli’s lungs. Winding, snaking, tendrils of blood that gleamed black against the dark alchemical circle.

“It is completed.” One of the attendants confirmed as he studied the circle, every inch of it now traced with blood. Eli’s blood.  
  
“ _Read_.” The master of ceremonies wheezed.  
  
Eli clutched the bowl, shaking where he stood as he stared at the vellum. He didn’t know what sorcery he was playing with, so he swallowed with difficulty and cleared his voice as best as he could.

Ας γίνει αυτή η συμφωνία δική μας μέχρι την αιωνιότητα. Δέξου την προσφορά μου αίματος. Σε καλώ χρυσό στρατηγό να εξοντώσει τους εχθρούς μου.

His tongue felt dead in his mouth, barely enunciating the words like a slug rolling between his jaws.

“You fool! Its supposed to be—”

Crimson light flared from the circle, flashing with the sparks of blood-red lightning that leaped from the stone and coursed around him. The bowl clattered as it left his fingers, but the hollow sound of it striking the floor was drowned by the surprised gasps and half-shouts from the others, himself included.

Eli froze, instinctively curling in on himself and lifting his arms around his head as a huge gust of wind slammed against him from below. He tottered, feeling the gale all around him like he had been thrown into a tornado.

Thick mists swept upwards as escaping ghouls, filling the entire hall with the sudden heaviness of a dense cloud cover and a choking smog. Coughing fits erupted, and the proud bannered eagle fell from the master’s hands, clanging like a thunderclap.  
  
There was a second flash of lightning. A sharp stab of pain in his eyes and a blinding brightness that threatened to scorch through clenched eyelids.  
  
Then it vanished, leaving spots of colour flowering against ominous darkness. The ashy mist that had flooded the hall began to dissipate as well, ethereally turning translucent with each second.

Eli blinked, trying to regain his vision. Then the movement of a dark shadow in front of him slammed a wave of shock and horror. He took a step backwards, tripped and fell heavily to the floor. Pain hit his lower back and elbows, but overpowered by the terror of the shape that solidified in front of him. Brilliant blue embers, licking tongues of small flames surrounded it.  
  
Then it unfurled its feathered wings, all six of them, and began to stand. Drawing itself up to full height and towering over Eli. Over the priests half-collapsed and hacking for air. Over the guards bent double and clawing at their throats, helmets flung with abandon. Mists parted from the titan form. Blue-skinned with a thick mane of black hair, glowing red eyes on a humanoid face pierced through Eli’s soul.

“Ah! Ah-ah.” Eli stuttered, his lips and tongue twitching and refusing to form words.

The being stared at him, then with a sharp flick its red eyes cast over his body. It made no sound, no visible emotion. Then it lifted its gaze and swept the interior. Intelligence glowed in its eyes, assessing its surroundings with a calm otherworldly scrutiny.  
  
Eli did the same, realising now that the being was clothed in its own set of black armour, of an elaborate design that he had never seen before. A skin like leather hugged his muscled frame, but covered in tiny scales that gleamed dully like the eyes of a dragonfly.

“Schite!” Came a strangled shout. “Kill him! Kill him now!” The raw grating voice screeched. Then Eli realised it belonged to the wheezing master of ceremonies.  
  
“No! Wait!” Eli yelped, too late.  
  
A guard hoisted his spear and flung it at the ungodly being, aim straight and through.  
  
Eli caught the blur of the spear, then as his eyes caught up with the shape he found himself transfixed on the weapon — hanging in mid-air. Silent. Unmoving. Frozen in place.  
  
Another bolt flew through the air from the opposite, and the being glanced at it distractedly. Then the weapon too, froze in the air.

From the far corner of the room, a clatter as a guard dropped his weapon in shock.

The being surveyed them, lips twisting with disgust as he held some of their gazes, then fixed his stare back on Eli, as if blaming him for this predicament. With the smallest twitch on his face, the two spears dropped to the marble, licked by the residual blue flames. Then he spoke.  
  
A language he could not understand. Rich, complex, lilting words that birthed no understanding in Eli’s mind. A foreign tongue in a voice so hollow and ethereal, it may as well be the music of the hosts.

The being paused, thoughtful, then narrowed his eyes.  
  
This time the voice spoke, and he heard the words though his ears heard no sound. A deep, stormy baritone that rumbled with authority and purpose in his mind.

  
**:: Our _pact_ is complete. Rise. ::**


	2. Chapter 2

For a long moment, Eli could not speak.

His mind spun, thoughts struggling to take hold but snuffed like candles.

And the room was even darker than before.

Shattered bowls of quartz glinted dimly. Candles melted to the floor in puddles of wax. The regal banner draped around the wings of the broken eagle steadily consumed by blue flames. Papers drifted like feathers from a mauled goose, charred and bitten. An eerie wind moaned a low howl, slithering through the tiny window-slits in stone, and through the tight corridors similarly fortified.

Sensing no response from Eli, the blue-skinned being stepped across the marble. Silent and slow.  
  
Eli trembled, tongue-tied and senseless.  
  
‘ _What have I done? What is this **monster**?_’

The titan that towered above him stiffened. Glowing red eyes thinning to slits as he looked down upon the summoner.

Then his gaze moved toward the papers scattered and shuffling across the ragged floor. And the others around them. Guards back-peddling from the scene. Priests still reeling and trying to regain their senses.

A bell tolled beyond the walls, clanging with the cadence of a petrified alarm.

An alarm that the being cocked his head at, but then ignored summarily.

A mere lift of his hand brought simultaneous cowers from the remnant others. One of the parchments fluttered, then lifted and swooped gracefully to his hand, resting between his fingers like a gentle dove. He lifted the vellum, lips thinning into a grimace at the ancient script.

It was uncomplicated and artless. A scant three lines. Yet somehow his summoner had still managed to trip over the words.

The paper crumbled, licked away by blue flames that sparked and died as swiftly as their fuel was consumed.

His burning gaze returned to the whimpering figure still sprawled on the floor, clad in plain, ill-fitting clothes. A manipulated child, he surmised.

And of the elaborately robed elders, barely conscious or completely decumbent. The subjugators?

Blood cried out to him from the circle — now cracked and sullied beyond repair.

How unfortunate. For the both of them.

Beside the ungodly figure, the spear he had discarded twitched and rose into the air, settling between his fingers. A sharp flick swept the pointed, tapered tip downwards, the pole aligning to his arm and resting across the back of his shoulder, just shy of his wings. With leisurely strides, the armoured being closed the distance toward the master of ceremonies.

Eli propped himself up.

The way it moved. The way it held the weapon. He had seen the spearmen training in the yard and instantly his mind had no doubt that this monster was also familiar with the use of it.

_‘It’s going to kill the priests!’_

His mind came to the realisation, then birthed a darker temptation. It would serve them justice. How many countless candidates had gone before him? Forced to walk this path to their spiritual gallows? Did they even survive a failed summoning? Would he survive?

The old man twisted, bony fingers scrabbling at the stone while his legs twitched uselessly beneath the sharp sickle beak and heartless breast of the splintered eagle.

“No… Stop this! It wasn’t my fault! I—Caaaghhh— I can help you! We can send you back. Caaaghhh!” He pleaded, voice rasping as blood dribbled down his beard and stained his teeth. Bubbles mixing with spittle against wispy white strands.

The being gave no indication that he heard, or even understood, the master. With a sharp kick against the elder’s shoulder, he snapped him flat against the floor.

A yelp of agony broke from the master, chorused with twisted moaning, warping like taut catgut.

The agonised sound shook Eli from his daze.

The being, whatever it was, could have easily ended the others in split seconds, faster than they could even respond to his levitations. But the way it… he took his time. The way he allowed them to spectate his every action. Every expression upon that inhuman, demonic face. Spoke of controlled malice. He wanted the wyrm beneath his feet to look upon him and suffer with the full knowledge that he would bring his ending.

It was personal.

A personal, vindictive vengeance.

The being swivelled the spear, freeing the pole from its restrained hold and angling the tip sharply downward. Inches from the wizened, helpless man. A thrust readied in the flex of his muscled arm.

“No! Stop!” Eli shouted. His voice ringing against the echoes of screams hanging on the molecules in the air.

The spear tip lingered in place. Loathed to withdraw.

But it did.

The being turned his head, looking at Eli. Then re-angled the spear into the restrained hold as before, allowing the sharpened tip to remain just by the head priest’s face. Death caressing his cheek.

**:: _You_ summoned me. ::**

The voice returned to Eli’s mind. Words resounding with masculine depth and the velvet insinuation of regret.

A smirk twisted the being’s deep blue lips. A smile that was largely unamused, if not for the scornful nature of their situation and the pitiful limits of his own summoner.

**:: To vanquish your enemies. _You_ wished for this. ::**

Eli tensed. “No! No I didn’t!” He denied reflexively, horrified. But he knew he did.

He had stopped it from a murder spree, but would it attack him first? _Could it_?

The being tilted his head, giving Eli a reproachful look. Then he tapped the speartip lightly, mockingly, against the master’s face and stepped away.

Eli breathed, sitting up and trying to organise his thoughts. Whatever the supernatural being was, it seemed to follow his orders. It was supposed to. But he was quite sure that the intent to take its first life was, mostly, of its own will. He curled his knees and clutched his head in his hands.

If it reacted to his wishes, he needed to clear his mind.

Breathe. Just breathe. What’s the basics here?

“Don’t hurt _anyone_.” He said, trying to think of the logic-web behind his own words. Anticipate what it might do. What limits he could impose. If he lost his temper by accident?

“Unless, I give a _verbal_ order.”

The glowing red eyes blinked slowly. Hinting that the being was unimpressed, or becoming disinterested.

Eli clenched his teeth.

“Don’t attack any—”

The sound of clattering armour and the orderly march of armour boots resounded through the corridor, growing louder with each second. Then the black, shiny forms bearing full-body shields strode into the hall. Crushing candles and the scattered quartz underfoot. They streamed in with military precision, bristling with the formidable knowledge that they would fight to their deaths at any moment.

Bordering the walls, they surrounded the devastated scene, encircling and closing in secondary rank. Shields faced forward, blades flashing as swords and spears were brought to bear against the inhuman monster.

The being stepped toward Eli, unfurling his wings protectively. Then, in a strange manner, he lowered his head and closed his eyes.

In the silence that followed, came the sound of more footsteps. A single person, walking seamlessly through the guarded procession. Clad in dark satin robes the colour of a moonless night, obscured with the shadow of a hood.

There was a strangled groan from beside them. A priest, formerly unconscious, struggled to his knees and shivered. Then crawled desperately toward the master of ceremonies and quickly tried to prop him up.

The newcomer strolled in and stopped a few steps within the circle of guards. Taking in the sight. Of the expensive etched marble, now marred with a webbing of deep cracks. Of the ceremony’s disastrous outcome, his priests barely alive. But most of all, of the ungodly being raising its six wings above the puny cadet; that had been one of hundreds of candidates in this elaborately secretive project.

The stranger raised his hands, drawing back the hood. Dim light revealed silvered strands of hair and pale skin, almost ghastly white. His face was covered with the wrinkles of age and wisdom, grey trimmed beard bearing a mouth that pursed with thoughtfulness. His brows were gentle, but his eyes held unspeakable knowledge and power of mastery. That everything before him, everything he saw, belonged to him. Lived to serve him alone.

Everything, except that unholy summon.

He looked at the priests, and wretched misery filled them.

When he spoke, his voice was calm. Like a grandfather asking a rather dim-witted child.

“Master of Ceremonies, where is my Golden General you promised? My _chrysó stratigó_?”

“Where, pray tell, is my Chosen One?”

Emperor Palpatine glowered.


	3. Chapter 3

Eli swallowed, quietly shifting his position and lowering his knees to the floor. Just when he was starting to compose himself and grasp his reality, the presence of the Emperor had shocked him back into his shell.

Emperor Palpatine turned to study the summoner candidate who was the cause of this catastrophe. “Who is this young... man?”

Eli flushed. The Emperor's pause sounded as if he had revised his assessment based on his uncertainty as to how the summon in their midst would react, not of any merit attributed to Eli on his own. Even as he felt his heart petrifying into a lump of coal and his tongue feeling like a dead slug, some inner part of him still took umbrage at this. He avoided the Emperor's gaze, trying to keep as still as possible as he awaited the judgement of his fate.

The priest hastily consulted his notes, flipping the pages bearing an elegant scrawl, neatly written and curated with the same religious fanaticism that guided their service. If anyone of the candidates should succeed by even a fraction, their bloodline would be traced so that more candidates could be procured. Or coerced by any means necessary. And, in the event of rebellion, ending their blood and salting the earth. Such were the guiding principles behind the meticulous records.

For several seconds, the sounds of shuffling parchment was all that Eli could focus on. It felt like an eternity. He opened his mouth, hearing the words against the hall of his own mind, rearing like stallions on the tip of his tongue. His name. If he died today, would anyone here remember his name beyond the utterance of a curse? Of course not. He was far from the people who loved him.

“Vanto, Eli, your majesty. He comes from the… the Paskal region, west of Eshotaar.”

“The Paskal region?” The emperor murmured thoughtfully.

“It's along the Outer Rim, bordering the Unknown Regions. We assimilated it seven years ago during the White Frost campaign.” Came a fresh voice, richly intoned and bearing the confidence, and nonchalance, of familiarity.

All logic screamed at Eli not to move, not to give them any reason to think that he snubbed decorum, of which he was clumsily, painfully, ignorant of. But curiosity prompted otherwise, and it scalded with each passing moment. He raised his head a little, catching sight of a middle-aged man dressed in black and grey silks, an impeccably tailored suit that fitted his form flawlessly. Neither ostentatious nor pauperise. A man who could be a charismatic merchant or a respectable minor noble. The flash of a golden signet glinted as the man placed a hand over his left breast and bowed respectfully.

“Tapalo. What is the issue here?” Emperor Palpatine welcomed him, in the relaxed manner that one might treat a close associate, or a confidante.

Tapalo walked to the marble, examining the splits that had cracked through the ornately carved geometries and sigils. It looked as random as lightning, but before his eyes they were as neatly ordered as a spider's architecture, bound within rules of physics and the planes between the worlds. He bent, drawing the smooth pads of his fingers across the deep canyons, and over the chiselled and carved stone. The lines skirted around certain bases of power, or arced directly to plateaus of affinities. Energy had been captured in the paths, in the depth and rigidity of the breaks, in the way it crashed through the crystallised grains of minerals.

“The issue is not in the graphe.” Tapalo announced as he straightened. “The summoning was executed beautifully. All restrictions and laws in the agreement have been enacted. Perhaps, it is in the rhema.” His eyes fell onto the being standing protectively over Eli like a statue. Deathly still. Its eyes still closed. “It should be possible to communicate with it, if they have begun communing.”

Graphe. Rhema. The words sounded like faint schoolbells in Eli’s mind.

 _Graphe_ , the written word. Did that refer to the intricate circle that he had stood upon, and shed his blood into? Did that contain the binding laws of the pact that the summoned being had proclaimed to have sealed with him? If so, he did not even know these laws; nor what else was written there. All he knew was a vague understanding, in the manner of a creaky hand-me-down desk that one cobbled together with bits and drabs of rogue thoughts, that he had been asked to call the Emperor’s beloved Golden General from beyond the Veil between worlds. And that if successful, the Emperor would have a new secret weapon that would assure his reign over the world, and a lasting era of peace. That if successful, his family would never want for anything in their lives ever again.

 _Rhema_ , the spoken word. That must have been the incantation that he had been ordered to read. The language for which he thought he had suffered the classes for his betterment. Never in his wildest dreams could he have imagined that instead of floundering with stacks of papers and bookkeeping, he would be teetering on the edge between worlds. Trading his blood for a spirit. Falling before the presence of the Emperor himself. Facing his final moments with a legion of guards ready to spear him a dozen times over.

“Th-that is true! It obeyed his command just now. It was going to kill me.” The Master of Ceremonies wheezed, every gasp for air bringing the ache of cracked ribs and a hunger in his lungs that could no longer be satisfied. “It is dangerous, your majesty. We should send it back!”

The Emperor's answer was a sharp look at his failed priests and a deepening scowl on his lips.

“The competency of your candidate has been brought to question, _former_ Master of Ceremonies. You would have us assuredly waste all that we have done? What sorry worth that remains, can you swear on that the next summoning will succeed?”

The aged skin and bones whimpered, finding no answer he could spin to alleviate his plight.

Fifty-three slabs of Black Verona marble, mined from the depths of the Death Valleys, once the stronghold and ceremonial slaughter ground of barbarious tribes. Engraved by the artful hands of the empire's best sculptors. Fifty-two slabs rejected due to imperfections in the marble, or in the script etchings. And now the final perfect piece, shattered.

“I strongly advise against it.” Tapalo slipped in seamlessly. “If the candidate managed to summon this creature, then the release procedure may suffer such deviations as well. It is, at least, bound to him now; and the pact demands its obedience.”

Tapalo's unspoken lines — what if this demonic force was accidentally released, but remained tethered to this plane, free to sow destruction at its pleasure? Or what other unfathomable misfortunes could befall if the spoken spell was mangled yet again?

The Emperor considered these words with a slight stroke of his chin. “Eli Vanto.” He sounded the name, as if tentatively sampling a taste of wine that was usually a few grades below what was suited for his palate.

“Yes sir. I mean, your majesty.” Eli replied hastily, sweat rolling down the side of his brow and his neck as he tried to ignore the many blades angled at him, and the monster he had brought into this world.

“Can you speak with it?”

“I- I can try. I was telling it not to attack when--”

“Good.” Palpatine cut him off. “Then you will translate my questions to it, and for your own sake, beseech it to answer truthfully.”

Eli wavered and nodded quickly, desperately. _Stupid answer._ Trying was not enough for the Emperor. Master of half the known world, Father of the Eternal Night, the Red Flame that danced on the graves of his enemies. Yet above Eli, was one that challenged such titles. Eli looked up at the being, feeling the cover of its huge feathers atop his crown and upon his back. He could smell them. The feathers. A musky scent, like a comfortable blanket huddled in winter. And a faint sweetness like lavender and honey. It made him feel like a hatched barnyard chicklet and he wasn't sure if he felt more terrified, awkward, or awed.

“I will translate the Emperor's questions, you will answer truthfully. Speak plainly in our tongue, if you can.” Eli stated, feeling equally foolish for parroting. All those months of study and he was now just a mouthpiece.

“Who are you?” “ _Who are you?_ ”

Slowly, the being's eyes opened, and centred his red glow on Palpatine. There was a slothful reluctance, like the pride of a lazy lion loathed to touch the language of its prey. Then it spoke. Carefully enunciating, as if talking to a child.

**“Mitth'raw'nuruodo.”**

The Emperor turned to look at his priests, but there was no answer forthcoming from their silent, frightened stares. Even Tapalo’s brow was creased with wrinkles as he searched his memories, then shook his head.

“What are you.” The Emperor ventured again.

“ _What are you._ ”

The being paused, considered its answer and the repercussions of it, then smiled as if it had found the hidden joke.

**“ _Ch'iss_ stratigos.”**

And that, was when Eli hoped that his death would be mercifully swift.


	4. Chapter 4

And there it was, the word that had cost him his destiny and perhaps the lives of his family.

The Emperor regarded his priests again, but he saw the answers from their blank expressions that conjured no comprehension, only the rising panic that each failure brought them one step closer to death. And worse, one step closer to an impeccably-controlled, agonising, and torturous end if the Emperor so wished.

_Ch'iss stratigos_. A chiss warrior of command and stratagem. Chiss…

Eli rolled the word on his tongue, hauntingly familiar and growing ever more so by the passing second. The thought of his family and their fate had triggered it, more so than the being's ungodly voice. He remembered sitting on the stones of their boundary walls on a cool night while his mother called them in to the lit fire. His father, sweeping his calloused, scarred hands over the Veil above, pointing out each star by name, and where they met the earth, each peak in the mountains by song; his breath warm against Eli's temple, childish giggles of pure delight singing with the crickets.

"Your Majesty. I-if I may. I think my…" Eli stumbled over his words, but his voice died completely then.

Family. Father.

If he mentioned those words, would they suspect him for summoning this being on purpose? Would his parents be summarily executed?

No… think Eli! He now had control over an otherworldly power that was bound to him. The Empire would hold his parents hostage to force him to continue his service without derailing their master plans. For now, by virtue of his own incompetent tongue, he was untouchable. They could not force him to transfer the summon, nor would they attack him.

Still, it was best not to draw too much attention to his house.

"What is it lad?" The Emperor smiled like a patient grandfather, but his eyes burned like candles in the shadowed hall.

"In Paskal, w-we have stories. Myths passed down for generations. L-legends. Uh… If I remember, the chiss are proud, deadly warriors that lived on the coldest, ice-capped mountains in the north."

  
The Emperor's smile broadened and Eli felt his blood curdle and a chilling ache in his chest. Like his lungs were collapsing on themselves. He regretted speaking out of turn and it sounded so foolish. Mere folklore, that was all a pathetic miner's son from a conquered, assimilated land could offer the most powerful man in the known world. He curled his fingers into the hem of his tunic, his cheeks burning with shame.

"Is that true?" Palpatine asked.

Several heartbeats passed.

"Well? Ask him!"

Eli flinched, then looked up at being still standing above him. It had never even considered to bow or kneel, and Eli felt hopelessly insignificant that he, the summoner, was still fighting the pain of the sharp quartz shards digging into his bended knee.

_"Is it true?"_

The chiss looked unimpressed. The smirk on its lips twisted deeper.

**"I am unfamiliar with your… stories."**

Tapalo interjected swiftly, with the wisdom of knowing that the Emperor had very little patience for fools. "His majesty means to ask it who the chiss are."

Eli gulped and quickly parroted the rephrased question. _"Who are the chiss?"_

**"My people."** Mitth'raw'nuruodo stated simply, his lids drooping with increasing boredom at the interrogation. He looked at the guards idly, almost as if assessing whether they would be tasty once their armour was cracked and peeled away.

It became evident then, that the being would be uncooperative to the very edges of reason and the limits of its pact if it so wished.

Eli wilted, _'could you be any less helpful?'_

**:: I can. ::** Mitth'raw'nuruodo spoke into Eli's mind, and Eli could sense the mild amusement it felt from their unease and terror, and its disgust. At what exactly, Eli could not pinpoint, but it was likely almost everything. The way it was called into this plane of existence. The way they scrambled to make sense of this uncorrectable error. And that they spoke as if it was a tool, or a servant slave, with no regard to its salient presence in their midst.

"Perhaps a night of rest would help ease the displaced summon in, and make it more agreeable in the morning." Tapalo suggested with an expert measure of calm and a venerable beacon of reason. "We must quickly instruct Eli in the details of the pact and bring about its agreement to pledge its servitude."

**“Vanto Eli’s allegiance is to you, therefore, you would command my allegiance as well.”** The glowing red eyes, irises barely discernible, locked with the Emperor’s.

Eli had looked up the moment the chiss had mentioned his name, and now he felt a skeletal caress on his skin where the being’s feathers brushed against him. Those lips. The words it spoke had not matched what he heard. What they all heard.

What sort of sorcery was this?

He looked around at the others, but he could not tell if they had noticed, or whether the demonic entity had been speaking in this manner all along, and he was the latecomer to notice only now. His lips parted, but no protest or exclamation came forth, silenced by the heavy blanket of fear that still smothered him.

He could barely process what was happening as the Emperor and Tapalos exchanged quiet words in private discussion. A thick haze separated him from the world as he was escorted down the long tunnel of stone, out under a cloudy sky into a heavily armoured carriage drawn by eight horses. He stared dumbly as the blue-skinned demon bent beneath the carriage’s door and sat across from him, all six wings vanishing in wisps of smoke like snuffed candles. He was a spectator of this nightmare, distantly wishing he could wake, captive to the puppetry that strung him along.

* * *

An unfamiliar bed. An unfamiliar ceiling. High and breezy, frescoed with the scene of puffy clouds and the winding sinuous body of a scaled wyvern, bearing long whiskers, the tines of a young hart, and a golden mane more befitting a maiden. A titan wrestled the wyvern, locked in a timeless scene of some epic celestial struggle that permeated so many tales of the deities.

Eli swore he could have died and ascended to heaven.

Or hell.

He turned onto his side, finding the chiss seated some distance away at the window, resting an elbow on his knee. The breeze ruffled his long black mane; his wings were nowhere to be seen. The moonlight made his blue skin glow with an eerie silver sheen, like the ocean waves. He looked out onto the human lands, and Eli wondered how foreign a sight it was to the being. Where did he come from? Why had he been chained to a human like him? Why did he answer the summoner’s call? Did he have a choice then?

“Are you a titan?” Eli's voice was barely above a whisper, but he knew he no longer needed to speak above the wind.

The glowing red eyes shifted suddenly onto the human.

The chiss took a moment of consideration. **“In your understanding, yes.”**

He wasn’t clueless of this world, Eli realised. Or perhaps he was from this world, as the Paskallian legends and stories had painted.

**“I am Κοιος.”**

Eli frowned, trying to understand. He had spent all of today trying to understand what was happening, and even now the words just seemed to slip between his grasp like water. “Did… did you say chaos?”

The being’s features stiffened. Surprised. Then its lips curled and it chuckled, shaking its head slowly. A mannerism that indeed made it seem like it was from this world. **“No. Koios.”** The chiss said, enunciating slowly and carefully as if it was talking to a lovable child.

Eli searched his memories, but he was so exhausted and he couldn’t even recall in entirety what Arca Veruna Tapalo and the colonel, whose home he was now sequestered in, had been explaining to him about the pact. “I… I’m sorry. I don’t understand.”

**:: You will. There is more I will teach you. ::**

**:: Sleep Eli. I will watch over you. ::**

The seraph’s voice in his mind resonated deep, with a husky quality. He could not understand how he could sense such things without actually hearing them, feeling and knowing more than his five senses ever told. Yet the unspoken voice was soothing, and Eli sank back into a bed so luxurious he had never dreamed of ever sleeping upon. Silken sheets slipping through his fingers like oil or the soft petals of a flower.

It was so strange. He had entertained the thought that he would be assassinated in some manner tonight. Some garish ghastly accident that would ensure the demon’s strings would pass into the Emperor’s control. Yet now, more than ever, he felt safe. It was almost like his father was seated by his bed, keeping the child-napping fey at bay.

The sun would rise tomorrow. Today’s nightmare would be yesterday.


	5. Chapter 5

Eli woke. The light streaming past the curtains of the high windows told him it was late morning, at the very least.

He could feel a languid weariness cling to him; as if he had swam the entire length of the Esho River in his sleep. He rolled over, feeling the aches deep in his muscles and joints. The training exercise yesterday had taken a toll on him and he was surprised that he hadn’t been dragged out of bed for another round of drills. If he sank into memory, he could still hear the instructor belting out the repetitive orders. Slash. Parry. Stab. Slide. It made him want to weep with exasperation at how weak he was.

Was it kind of them to allow him to sleep in and rest? Or had it been his summon’s doing? Whatever it was, he didn’t want to look a gift horse in the mouth.

He nuzzled against the pillow, smelling the downy scent of feathers in the stuffing, though whether from ducks or geese he couldn’t tell which. As he contemplated going back to sleep, a different scent pricked his nose. It smelled musty, like some kind of slightly rancid animal oil, and the earthy mud.

He pushed himself up and became vaguely aware of a slight resistance. An unfamiliar weight on his legs. Not quite the heavy covers of the duvet that he had grown used to.

With wordless shock, he took in the sight.

Heavenly white feathers. A proud graceful neck. Thick chest. Lush tail. Long delicate eyelashes, framing vacant glassy eyes. A porcelain-pink beak, parted to reveal a still, thin tongue. And a rounded breast and rump to which the feathers had stained with clay and sand.

“THRRAAWWWN!” Eli yelped, flooded with horror and revulsion as he scrambled backwards. Pressed himself flat against the head post till he felt the carved wood digging into his back.

The limp form flopped about on the bed as he kicked it away and curled his knees to his chest. It was very dead.

“THRAAWN!” Eli screeched again.

With a sudden snap in the air, he appeared in the room. Static sizzled and crackled against the carpets; smelling of ozone and the storm. Dark smoke lingered on his form. Ink-black wings that had shielded him from the chaotic energies of the translocation spell unfurled from his face and body. His hand had clenched the grip of his spear, but upon sensing no one else in the room, or even in the hallway, he relaxed immediately. The tension eased quickly and there was a strange serenity, or mild confusion, in the blood-red eyes of the demonic-looking being.

“Yes Eli?” Thrawn whirred softly. As if answering a child’s tantrum.

Eli barely batted an eye at Thrawn’s teleportation. “What- What is this?” Eli pointed at the dead bird.

Thrawn eyed the hapless creature. And looked back at Eli with apparently no understanding of his summoner’s concern.

“Your breakfast.” Thrawn said, leaning the spear aside and moving over to sit on the edge of the bed.

Eli let out a soft moan, burying his face behind his hands as he tried to collect his thoughts. What? How? When? And by the gods and titans _WHY_? Why was Thrawn giving him dead animals like a cat?!

“You missed breakfast. Some meat in your diet would be more helpful in fulfilling the requirements of your combat training.” Thrawn explained calmly, trying to soothe his apparently distraught summoner.

Eli glared at him. He wasn’t sure if Thrawn had heard his thoughts, or sensed the intent of his rhetorical questions. “But a peacock?! A PEACOCK?!” He flapped a hand over the dead peafowl. Just how long had he been in bed with that deceased thing?! How revolting!

“I told you not to kill anything without my permission!” Eli hissed, trying not to scream any louder than he already had in case the guards found reason to investigate.

“You said not to hurt or attack _anyone_. I do not think animals are considered persons.” Thrawn’s lips twisted.

 _Ye gods_. Eli pressed his palms against his eyes, trying to think past the confusion and shock of sleeping in bed with a bird’s corpse.

Another thought occurred to him then. They were living on the colonel’s estate weren’t they? Everything on the grounds belonged to him. “Colonel Yularen’s peacock?” He gasped.

Thrawn’s blank stare was all the confirmation he needed.

“You have to get rid of it! Throw it in a ditch or a pond, and make sure nobody sees you!” Eli shuffled to the side of the bed, stumbling slightly as his foot caught on the tangle of bedlinen.

“You’re… not going to eat it?” Thrawn frowned with disappointment.

“No!” Eli hissed agitatedly. He drew in a deep breath, trying to calm himself. It’s fine. It’s not a dead person at least. Thrawn just didn’t understand. Even if the Colonel found out, at least it wasn’t a dead guard or one of the estate servants. “Thrawn. We only kill certain animals for… consumption.”

“Ducks. Geese. Pheasants.” Thrawn reached over to curl his fingers under the pale head of the peafowl, lifting it up carelessly as he stood. “He should be glad to be rid of this one. It was most… discourteous.”

“It’s also discourteous to be throwing dead things into bed with people!” Eli snapped and pointed at the window, “now get it out of here before one of the maids sees it!”

He could see Thrawn’s upper lip twitch in a reluctant snarl, but his word was final.

With a recalcitrant demeanour, the chiss warrior yanked one of the long tail feathers from the bird’s tail. Eli almost expected him to drop it defiantly on the ground and leave him to deal with it. Instead, Thrawn drew the long ticklish strand under Eli’s chin.

“Of course, _Master_. I will find some other way to make you scream my name.”

Eli’s mind went blank.

Thrawn was long gone by the time Eli had recovered enough to sputter curses.

**Author's Note:**

> Just a series of short medieval/fantasy ficlets, possibly in non-chronological order, to take a break from my other fic "Chimaera Rising".


End file.
